The Healthcare Theory Podcast

Nikhil Reddy

Discover where healthcare is headed with The Healthcare Theory. Through recurring mini-series, we unpack everything from health policy to life sciences and digital health. Tune in every week for insightful conversations with founders, researchers, and industry experts that are shaping the future of healthcare.

  1. Why Free Markets Break in Healthcare | Wharton Professor Dr. Atul Gupta

    Episode 1 ·  Video

    Why Free Markets Break in Healthcare | Wharton Professor Dr. Atul Gupta

    In this episode, we speak with Dr. Atul Gupta, a professor at the Wharton School, about the role of free markets in healthcare, along with the broader tradeoffs between quality and efficiency. We start by discussing how information asymmetry, third-party payment, and limited competition make it difficult for the “invisible hand” to function in healthcare. Dr. Gupta then walks through his research on hospital readmission penalties, showing how financial incentives can improve care while also creating room for hospitals to game the metrics. We also explore the trade-offs behind hospital privatization and consolidation, including how efforts to make hospitals more efficient or profitable can affect prices, staffing, safety-net access, and patient outcomes. Finally, we examine private equity’s role in healthcare and what better regulation, transparency, and quality-linked incentives could look like in the future.

    49 min
  2. The Collapse of Trust in Public Health | U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Richard Carmona

    Episode 2 ·  Video

    The Collapse of Trust in Public Health | U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Richard Carmona

    Today's guest is Dr. Richard Carmona, the 17th Surgeon General of the United States, a trauma surgeon, public health leader, former hospital executive, and decorated Army Special Forces medic. In this episode, we explore how Dr. Carmona’s early life, military service, and medical career shaped his understanding of healthcare as far more than what happens inside a hospital. He discusses building Arizona’s regional trauma system, turning around a public hospital, and why prevention, health literacy, and trust are central to improving outcomes. We also dive into the politicization of public health, from tobacco and vaccines to the growing confusion around scientific institutions today. Dr. Carmona explains why the Surgeon General’s role should be nonpartisan, grounded in science, and focused on helping the public make better health decisions. At its core, this conversation is about what happens when science, politics, and trust collide, and what it will take to rebuild confidence in American healthcare.

    47 min
  3. The Tradeoffs Behind Value-Based Care | Harvard Professor Dr. Meredith Rosenthal

    Episode 3 ·  Video

    The Tradeoffs Behind Value-Based Care | Harvard Professor Dr. Meredith Rosenthal

    Today’s guest is Dr. Meredith Rosenthal, the C. Boyden Gray Professor of Health Economics and Policy at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, where her work focuses on the behavioral economics and incentives behind value-based care. In this episode, we discuss why healthcare is filled with tradeoffs, from how doctors are paid to how hospitals are held accountable for quality and outcomes. Dr. Rosenthal breaks down the difference between fee-for-service and value-based payment, and why designing better incentives is much harder than simply rewarding “better care.” We also explore the behavioral economics behind healthcare decision-making, including how payment models can affect providers, patients, equity, and access. Finally, we talk about the future of value-based care, the limits of measuring quality, and whether payment reform can help address America’s healthcare affordability crisis.

    44 min
  4. The Diagnostic Gap in Dentistry | $550m Overjet CEO Dr. Wardah Iman

    Episode 4 ·  Video

    The Diagnostic Gap in Dentistry | $550m Overjet CEO Dr. Wardah Iman

    Today’s guest is Wardah Inam, Founder & CEO of Overjet, who began her career with a PhD at MIT and is bringing that research into healthcare to rethink how dental diagnostics are done. In this episode, we explore why diagnostics in dentistry have historically been inconsistent and how variation across providers impacts both trust and outcomes. We discuss how turning X-rays into measurable data can shift care from subjective interpretation to more standardized decision-making. We also dive into the operational side of healthcare—how documentation, insurance, and administrative workflows shape what care actually gets delivered. Finally, we look ahead at a future where diagnostics are continuous, transparent, and integrated into broader health, rather than something patients only encounter when something goes wrong.

    45 min
  5. Changing The Last Mile of Healthcare | Zingage CEO Victor Hunt

    Episode 5 ·  Video

    Changing The Last Mile of Healthcare | Zingage CEO Victor Hunt

    In this episode, we’re joined by Victor Hunt, co-founder and CEO of Zingage, a platform focused on fixing the logistics behind home care delivery. We start by diving into his background and how growing up around a home care business shaped the way he thinks about healthcare. From there, we explore why home care is evolving into a core distribution layer for the entire healthcare system. We break down the real bottleneck in the space—not a lack of caregivers, but the complexity of coordinating them at scale. Finally, we discuss how AI can unlock that constraint and what the future looks like as more care shifts into the home.

    38 min
  6. What's Next for Personalized Medicine? | Sapient Bio CEO Dr. Jonathan Usuka

    Episode 6 ·  Video

    What's Next for Personalized Medicine? | Sapient Bio CEO Dr. Jonathan Usuka

    Dr. Jonathan Usuka, CEO of Sapient Bio, is building high-dimensional proteomics platforms to help pharma understand disease at the molecular level and develop more targeted therapies. With a career spanning early computational genomics during the Human Genome Project, to R&D roles at Roche and Celgene, and later pharmaceutical analytics at McKinsey, he has consistently worked at the intersection of biology and data. In this episode, we explore the shift from organ-based definitions of disease to biomarker-driven subtypes and ultimately toward truly personalized medicine. We discuss why proteins and metabolites—not just DNA—are key to understanding what’s actually happening inside patients in real time. We also dive into how AI is unlocking massive amounts of clinical data and why the biggest bottlenecks today lie in clinical trials, patient identification, and making sense of increasingly complex biological systems.

    41 min
  7. Neuroscience's Computation Revolution | $529m Precision Neuroscience President Dr. Craig Mermel

    Episode 7 ·  Video

    Neuroscience's Computation Revolution | $529m Precision Neuroscience President Dr. Craig Mermel

    In this episode, we speak with Dr. Craig Mermel, President and Chief Product Officer at Precision Neuroscience, a company building non-invasive brain-computer interfaces that translate neural signals to restore neurological function for patients. Craig began his career as an MD-PhD at Harvard, where he studied at the intersection of biology and computation during the early genomics revolution. We talk about how that experience shaped his view that biology is increasingly becoming a data problem, and how that perspective carried into his work at Apple and Google. He breaks down what brain-computer interfaces actually are, the tradeoffs between different approaches, and why you don’t need perfect neural data to drive meaningful outcomes. Ultimately, this conversation explores how turning signals from genes to neurons into computable data is shaping the future of healthcare.

    40 min
  8. Can AI Fit into Clinical Decision-Making? | $350m Regard Chief Medical Officer Dr. Francisco Alvarez

    Episode 8 ·  Video

    Can AI Fit into Clinical Decision-Making? | $350m Regard Chief Medical Officer Dr. Francisco Alvarez

    In this episode, we sit down with Dr. Francisco Alvarez, a doctor and Chief Medical Officer at Regard, to explore a fresh perspective on how AI is actually being used inside real hospital workflows. We start by breaking down what it really feels like to practice medicine today: navigating fragmented systems and overwhelming amounts of patient data. We then dive into how Regard is building AI tools to surface insights, streamline documentation, and reduce the cognitive burden on clinicians. We also discuss why physicians aren’t looking to be replaced, but instead want better tools to support their decision-making. Finally, we explore the deeper structural challenges in healthcare, from interoperability to misaligned incentives, and what it will take for AI to truly improve patient care.

    37 min
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5
out of 5
3 Ratings

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Discover where healthcare is headed with The Healthcare Theory. Through recurring mini-series, we unpack everything from health policy to life sciences and digital health. Tune in every week for insightful conversations with founders, researchers, and industry experts that are shaping the future of healthcare.

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